Upcoming Tobacco Webinars

Webinar - Tobacco Cessation Coverage: Implementation of the Affordable Care Act in 2014

 

The Smoking Cessation Leadership Center (SCLC) is hosting “Tobacco Cessation Coverage: Implementation of the Affordable Care Act in 2014,” a free webinar that takes place tomorrow, May 15, 2014 at 1:00pm Eastern Time/ 10:00am Pacific Time (90 minutes). Jennifer Singleterry, Director of National Health Policy at the American Lung Association, will be presenting on the topic.

 

Webinar Objectives:

• Explain major initiatives of the ACA, and identify areas that affect tobacco users 
• Identify tobacco cessation treatments covered for various populations in the state 
• Learn to implement changes to systems and practices that will help tobacco users quit and take advantage of new opportunities

REGISTER HERE:https://cc.readytalk.com/r/35ndin4xmweb&eom

 

For additional resources and information about accreditation, click here.

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Webinars: Tobacco Cessation, Medicaid and the ACA: What’s New in 2014?

Implementation of the Affordable Care Act (ACA) is in full swing and there are important changes happening to Medicaid. Some of these changes will affect what tobacco cessation treatments are available to Medicaid enrollees, and how they receive treatment. In this hour-long webinar, experts from the American Lung Association will explore how ACA implementation is affecting Medicaid coverage of tobacco cessation treatments, including the provision that prohibits Medicaid programs from excluding coverage of tobacco cessation medications as of January 1, 2014. Join us to learn more about these provisions and what they mean for Medicaid enrollees and healthcare providers.

This webinar will be offered twice. Below is information regarding the date and time and the link to sign up. Information about the webinar, including call-in information will be sent out to registered participants prior to the call.

Date: Thursday, May 22, 2014
Time: 3pm Eastern
Sign up here: https://bookwhen.com/fhngg/201405221500/mrw

Date: Wednesday, June 18, 2014
Time: 2pm Eastern
Sign up here: https://bookwhen.com/fhngg/201406181400/ehe

If you have any questions about these webinars, please contact Anne DiGiulio at anne.digiulio@lung.org.

ACA Tobacco Cessation Requirement Guidance

Last week the Obama Administration issued a FAQ document making clear the tobacco cessation services that health insurers are required to cover under the Affordable Care Act. This guidance tells insurers that they must cover, without cost-sharing, screening for tobacco use and, for those who use tobacco products, at least two tobacco cessation attempts per year.  This coverage should include four tobacco counseling sessions and FDA-approved tobacco cessation medications. 

Here is a link to the guidance – the tobacco cessation information is in Question 5: http://www.dol.gov/ebsa/faqs/faq-aca19.html.  

Here is a link to the CTFK statement: http://www.tobaccofreekids.org/press_releases/post/2014_05_02_obama

Victoria Almquist
Director, Outreach
Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids  

“Tobacco Cessation Coverage: Implementation of the Affordable Care Act in 2014”

The Smoking Cessation Leadership Center (SCLC) is pleased to invite you to our next free webinar, “Tobacco Cessation Coverage: Implementation of the Affordable Care Act in 2014”, on May 15, 2014 at 1:00pm Eastern Time/ 10:00am Pacific Time (90 minutes).

We are honored to have Jennifer Singleterry, Director of National Health Policy at the American Lung Association, presenting on this topic for us.

Webinar Objectives: 

·         Explain major initiatives of the ACA, and identify areas that affect tobacco users

·         Identify tobacco cessation treatments covered for various populations in the state

·         Learn to implement changes to systems and practices that will help tobacco users quit and take advantage of new opportunities

REGISTER HERE:    https://cc.readytalk.com/r/35ndin4xmweb&eom

Additional resources [UPDATED]:

·         Recently released guidance by the Obama administration on tobacco cessation benefits available through the ACA (see Q5).

·         Press release from the American Lung Association on the new guidance

·         A report by the Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) and Breakaway Policy Strategies, “Eight Million and Counting: A Deeper Look at Premiums, Cost Sharing and Benefit Design in the New Health Insurance Marketplaces”

·         A report [PDF] by the North American Quitline Consortium (NAQC) answering the question, “How can we most effectively maximize the impact of the Affordable Care Act on access to, and coverage of, tobacco cessation for Medicaid enrollees?”

 Accreditation:

The University of California, San Francisco (UCSF) School of Medicine is accredited by the Accreditation Council for Continuing Medical Education to provide continuing medical education for physicians.

UCSF designates this live activity for a maximum of 1.5 AMA PRA Category 1 Credits^TM. Physicians should claim only the credit commensurate with the extent of their participation in the webinar activity.

Participants who join the LIVE session, on May 15, 2014, can claim CME/CEU credit for $35 per certificate. You will receive instructions on how to claim credit via the post webinar email.

Don’t need to claim CME/CEUs?  SCLC issues free certificates of attendance for those who want contact hours only.

Please feel free to forward this announcement to your colleagues.  For questions, contact Jennifer Matekuare, SCLC Operations Manager, at jmatekuare@medicine.ucsf.edu, or call toll-free (877) 509-3786.  This webinar will be recorded and may be viewed online on the Smoking Cessation Leadership Center’s website after the presentation. 

Uneven progress in expanding state Medicaid coverage for smoking cessation

States make gradual progress, but few provide comprehensive coverage More smokers would quit if state Medicaid programs covered more cessation treatments and removed barriers to coverage, according to a CDC study published in today’s Morbidity and Mortality Weekly Report. All 50
states and the District of Columbia cover cessation treatments for at least some Medicaid enrollees.

Efforts to expand state Medicaid coverage for all smoking cessation treatments and the removal of coverage barriers have shown mixed progress over the past five years.

Americans enrolled in Medicaid are more likely to smoke than the general population, and smoking-related disease is a major contributor to increasing Medicaid costs. Insurance coverage of proven cessation treatments leads to more smokers using the treatments and successfully quitting smoking. A recent study from the American Journal of Preventive Medicine found that more comprehensive state Medicaid coverage was associated with increased quit rates among smokers enrolled in Medicaid.
Seven states cover all approved medications and in-person counseling cessation treatments for all Medicaid recipients. All states have some barriers to getting these treatments. The most common barriers are limits on how long treatment is covered and how much is covered per year; prior authorization requirements; and copayments.

“States can save lives and reduce costs by providing Medicaid coverage for all proven cessation treatments, removing barriers to accessing these treatments, and promoting the expanded coverage,” said Tim McAfee, M.D., M.P.H., Director of the CDC’s Office on Smoking and Health. “Reducing the number of smokers will save lives and reduce health care costs.”

The study compares 2008 with 2014 data and found that 41 states made changes to the treatments they covered for at least some plans or populations. Nineteen states added treatments to coverage without removing any treatments from coverage and eight states removed treatments from coverage without adding any treatments to coverage. Fourteen states both added and removed coverage.
During this same period, 38 states made changes to barriers to accessing treatments for at least some plans or populations. Nine states removed barriers without adding new barriers, 12 states added new barriers without removing existing ones, and 17 states both removed and added barriers.

“There’s evidence suggesting that smokers enrolled in Medicaid, like other smokers, want to quit and will take advantage of covered cessation treatments to help them quit for good,” said Stephen Babb, M.P.H., co-author of the article.

Some of the strongest evidence comes from Massachusetts, which expanded its Medicaid cessation coverage in 2006.

“Massachusetts heavily promoted its new Medicaid cessation coverage to Medicaid enrollees and health care providers, and saw a drop in the smoking rate among Medicaid enrollees from 38 percent to 28 percent,” said Babb. There was also an almost 50 percent drop in hospital admissions for heart attacks among those who used the benefit. It is important that all smokers who want help quitting, including smokers enrolled in Medicaid, have access to proven cessation treatments and services.”

Fifty years after the first Surgeon General’s Report linking cigarette smoking to lung cancer, smoking remains the leading cause of preventable death and disease in the United States, killing nearly half a million Americans every year. More than 16 million Americans live with a smoking-related disease. Smoking-related diseases cost Americans $132 billion a year in direct health care expenses, much of which comes in taxpayer-supported payments. The most recent Surgeon General’s Report, released in January 2014, recommends providing barrier-free access to proven cessation treatments, and expanding cessation services for all smokers in primary and specialty care settings.

Through the Affordable Care Act, more Americans will qualify to get health care coverage that fits their needs and budget, including important preventive services such as certain services to quit smoking that may be covered with no additional costs. Visit Healthcare.gov or call 1-800-318-2596 (TTY/TDD 1-855-889-4325) to learn more.
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U.S. Department of Health and Human Services CDC works 24/7 saving lives, protecting people from health threats, and saving money through prevention. Whether these threats are global or domestic, chronic or acute, curable or preventable, natural disaster or deliberate attack, CDC is the
nation’s health protection agency.

Camp Get Covered America

Reposted at http://www.tobaccodeathray.blogspot.com,
Description:	Get Covered America is launching a certification program - to make sure that everyone involved is on the same page and talking about the new health insurance options with clarity and confidence. Want to be one of the first people in Central Ohio to get certifiied? Join us to learn about the enrollment process, what folks can look forward to in terms of coverage, and how to connect folks to the right resources to get them covered.
Time:	Saturday, August 17, 2013 2:00 PM - 3:00 PM EDT
Host:	Matt Caffrey
Contact Phone:	614-859-2856
Location:	Grandview Heights Public Library (Columbus, OH) 1685 W 1st Ave Columbus, OH 43212

Insurance Marketplace Informtion and Assistance

Posted at http:/www.darkestcloset.blogspot.com,

Confused about the application and enrollment process for insurance marketplace? Go to
http://marketplace.cms.gov/getofficialresources/multimedia/multimedia.html to great step-by step, easy to understand videos on the process and answers to your most frequently asked questions.

Tobacco resourse-including ACA and Tobacco

Study Finds E-Cigarettes Used Primarily for Quitting Smoking

Three-quarters of people who use e-cigarettes say their motivation was to replace cigarettes, a new survey finds. People using e-cigarettes believe they are safer than regular cigarettes, the researchers say.

 Is Snus the Same as Dip? Smokers' Perceptions of New Smokeless Tobacco Advertising.  Tobacco Control (Mar 2013). Current smoker responses to snus advertising are not consistent with harm reduction. 

 Toolkit: Tobacco Cessation and the Affordable Care Act.  American Lung Association.  Contains materials and analyses exploring ACA provisions that address tobacco cessation and prevention, as well as factsheets, template letters, and other helpful tools.

·         Fact sheet: The Mental Health Parity and Addiction Equity Act and the Affordable Care Act: Implications for Coverage of Tobacco Cessation Benefits.  Tobacco Control Legal Consortium.  Addresses how these federal laws affect insurance coverage for one type of substance use disorder benefits: tobacco cessation benefits.

·         Implementation of tobacco cessation coverage under the Affordable Care Act: Understanding how Private Health Insurance Policies Cover Tobacco Cessation Treatments.  The Georgetown University Health Policy Institute, with funding from the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. Report concludes that many private insurance plans are failing to provide coverage for smoking cessation treatment as required by the Affordable Care Act.

Smokers may get a break from Obamacare glitch

Posted at MSN.com Reposted at http://www.tobaccodeathray.blogspot.com,

 

Tobacco users are slated to pay penalties under Obama's new health care law, but a computer glitch leads to another implementation delay.

WASHINGTON — Some smokers trying to get coverage next year under President Barack Obama's health care law may get a break from tobacco-use penalties that could have made their premiums unaffordable.

 

The Obama administration — in yet another health care overhaul delay — has quietly notified insurers that a computer system glitch will limit penalties that the law says the companies may charge smokers. A fix will take at least a year to put in place.

Older smokers are more likely to benefit from the glitch, experts say. But depending on how insurers respond to it, it's also possible that younger smokers could wind up facing higher penalties than they otherwise would have.

Some see an emerging pattern of last-minute switches and delays as the administration scrambles to prepare the Oct. 1 launch of new health insurance markets. People who don't have coverage on the job will be able to shop for private insurance, with tax credits to help pay premiums. Small businesses will have their own insurance markets.

Last week, the White House unexpectedly announced a one-year postponement of a major provision in the law that requires larger employers to offer coverage or face fines. Officials cited the complexity of the requirement as well as a desire to address complaints from employers.
For more of this article go to http://news.msn.com/us/smokers-may-get-a-break-from-obamacare-glitch?ocid=ansnews11

Related: Federal govt delays key requirement of Obamacare until 2015
Related: Are non-smokers smarter than smokers?
Related: 1-in-5 US smokers has tried an e-cigarette
 

"Bridging the Gap between Health and Mental Health for Persons with Serious Mental Health Conditions"

 Reposted at http://www.tobaccodeathray.blogspot.com,

A Special Webinar:  June 19, 2013  3:00 - 4:30 p.m. Eastern Time.

"Bridging the Gap between Health and Mental Health for Persons with Serious Mental Health Conditions"

Improving the quality of life through the integration of health and mental health is one of the key goals of U.S. federal initiatives including the Affordable Health Care Act, the Substance Abuse and Mental Health Services Administration's Center for Integrated Health Solutions and the Centers for Medicare and Medicaid.

 In this webinar, presenters will be considering the systems, services and individual perspectives on the need and the opportunities to bridge the divide between health and mental health. The webinar will begin with an overview of research on health/mental health integration.  Following this, a person with lived experience who has been a student in the Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation's Recovery Services, will tell her story about how the absence of integration and collaboration led to serious problems.  Finally, presenters will describe the program at Boston University and how it was replicated and adapted in Arizona with approval and funding by Medicaid.  Presenters from Boston University Center for Psychiatric Rehabilitation include:

 

Marianne Farkas, Sc.D., Director of Training and Technical Assistance

Dori Hutchinson, Sc.D., Director of Recovery Services and

Gloria Dickerson, Recovery Services Alumnae

 For information see:

http://cpr.bu.edu/develop/webinar/bridging-the-gap

 

ACA and Tobacco Cessation

ActionToQuit attended a briefing entitled The Affordable Care Act and Tobacco Cessation: Advocating for Clarity and Accountability.  The speaker, Mila Kofman, presented the results of a report published by the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids and the Georgetown University’s Health Policy Institute examining 39 health plans to determine the degree to which they provided the cessation benefits required under the Affordable Care Act (ACA).  Mila is also the Executive Director of the District of Columbia Health Benefit Exchange and is a nationally recognized expert on private health insurance markets.  She discussed the finding of the report which revealed poor performance among insurers across the board in providing the ACA-required tobacco cessation benefits. In addition, she encouraged tobacco control advocates within states to inform their state insurance commissioner of these compliance issues and ensure tobacco users are receiving the coverage required under the law.

 

These results are especially relevant after yesterday’s announcement of the final rule outlining health insurance issuer standards for a core package of benefits, called essential health benefits, that insurers must cover both under the ACA.

 

For more information on ACA and how it impacts tobacco cessation, check out the American Lung Association’s toolkit which provides materials and analyses exploring ACA provisions that address tobacco cessation and prevention.

Community Benefit:Opportunity for Public Health Hospital Collaborations

Community Benefit: An Opportunity for Public Health and Hospitals to Work Together

Recent changes in federal law have created an opportunity for hospitals, public health departments, and community groups to forge new partnerships and improve health. To maintain their tax-exempt status, nonprofit hospitals must provide benefits to the communities they serve. Historically, hospitals’ community benefit activities have focused on providing charity care and other forms of uncompensated care. The Affordable Care Act (ACA) establishes standard requirements for nonprofit hospitals concerning community benefit reporting, community health needs assessments, and strategies to improve the health of the communities they serve. These strategies for population health improvement have the potential to bring key partners together in communities to work toward identifying and addressing important health priorities.

 The Robert Wood Johnson Foundation (RWJF) summarizes recent changes in federal law pertaining to this community benefit in a new brief, What’s New with Community Benefit? The brief and related reports are available here.

 

Reposted at http://www.tobaccodeathray.blogspot.com,

Health Insurance Plans Fall Short in Covering Mandated Tobacco Cessation Treatments

Many health insurance plans are failing to provide coverage mandated by the health care reform law for treatments to help smokers and other tobacco users quit, according to a study of insurance contracts by Georgetown University researchers conducted for the Campaign for Tobacco-Free Kids. The authors recommend that federal and state regulators give insurers detailed guidance on what tobacco cessation coverage is required under the landmark Affordable Care Act (ACA). The ACA requires all new private health insurance plans to cover preventive health services recommended with an A or B grade by the U.S. Preventive Services Task Force (USPSTF), with no cost-sharing such as co-pays. These recommendations include tobacco cessation treatments, which received an A grade. The USPSTF recommends that clinicians ask adults about tobacco use and provide cessation interventions for tobacco users. It found that more or longer counseling sessions improve quit rates and combining counseling with medication is more effective for treating tobacco dependence than either therapy used alone.

The report is attached to this blogpage Reports section.

Reprinted at http://www.tobaccodeathray.blogspot.com